Vampire Christmas Carol
by eilonwya10
Summary: Aro was sure of the past; he just wasn't sure whose past it was. Three linked ficlets in which the Volturi or the Cullens deal with Christmas past, present, and future. Relatively cheerful but involves grim social issues (as did the original Christmas Carol). Day 23 (carols) of the 25 Days of Fic Challenge.


**A/N:** _The Twilight vampires are the property of Stephenie Meyer. This is one of my cheerier stories and contains nothing graphic, but it exposes the vampires to current social issues that are sad and/or frightening. Day 23 (carols) of the 25 Days of Fic Challenge._

* * *

1

Aro was sure of the past; he just wasn't sure whose past it was.

A memory that thronged with ten thousand lives was a memory from which it was impossible to withdraw any one set of experiences with the certainty that these were his and he should learn from them.

Had he been an apprentice in a London trading house during the short reign of King William IV? He thought not, but there it was, settled permanently in his immortal brain: the cobblestone streets, the coal-filthy air, the sudden joy of an unexpected half holiday on Christmas Eve, the smell of roast goose (no longer appetizing in what he called real life, but the memory salivated), the voices raised in carols, and the breathless rumpus of country dances.

Aro tucked his cracked-marble hands deeper into the sleeves of his robes and smiled at the Volturi and their assembled guests. An expression of benevolent wisdom was an excellent disguise for stupefaction.

2

In the mall on Christmas Eve, Edward felt as if a thousand drummers were playing their solos on his head, and not just because of the particularly smarmy version of "The Little Drummer Boy" on the muzak.

_If I don't find something expensive, we'll argue all day tomorrow._

_How is it this difficult to find a size large sweater in pink? Six stores, I swear, and all I see is that damned shade of orange._

_Ham in the oven for twenty minutes a pound. The kids'll have me up that early anyway. Green bean casserole. Potatoes au gratin. No, that's too heavy. Potatoes in chunks with olive oil and rosemary. Spiced apple sauce. Bread from Trader Joe's. It's not like his family ever aspired to more than Brown 'n' Serve rolls, so there's no point in that woman getting snarky at me._

_So he PLAYED for him bah-RUMPA-bum-bum. This was fun in choir, but man, it gets stuck in your head._

_If we don't have to stay late to close, I can just make it to the pharmacy for Timmy's prescription. Maybe this one will work. How do you tell a kid he's not getting presents because of what his meds cost? Merry Christmas, Timmy! Your gift is that you're not dead. Enjoy it._

Edward followed the thought across the chaos to the middle checkstand at J.C. Penney. The clerk's dark hair was pinned up on her head; her polo shirt was loose in the shoulders; and her glasses slid down her thin nose. The litany of her worries about Timmy ran unstopping behind a smile that never wavered.

Run fast enough among oblivious people and they never notice. Edward was at the toy store at the other end of the mall at a speed that made him wonder if Santa Claus was a vampire.

"What are the most popular toys for eight-year-old boys?" Edward asked the clerk he saw. He bought all of them.

When he went through the line at J.C. Penney and dropped the boxes on the checkstand, the clerk automatically tried to scan them. On her third try, she stopped and really looked at the boxes.

"I'm so sorry, sir, but if you're trying to make a return, we don't sell those here." Her smile revealed a tiny gap between her front teeth. She smelled like tiny violets that grow in the woods.

"I'm not. They're for Timmy."

"I don't. . . I never. . ." Her smile slipped on the tear starting down her cheek.

"If he won't like them, I'll get something else."

"No. . . He'll love them." Her eyes behind the glasses were hazel. The big veins were blue behind the thin skin of her neck, just inside the collar of the polo. "You must be an angel."

"I'm anything but an angel." Edward tried a smile. He'd never been good at casual conversation. "Just tell Timmy that Santa brought them."

3

Going caroling with the family was a mistake, Alice realized. It was one of those nights—when other people's futures flickered across her brain like the spinning zoetrope Edward had shown her.

_A woman in white walking down an aisle toward a man who shifts his feet. . . he's on a yacht with two models. . . he's wrinkled, hunched in a chair and lonely. . . he's hefting a child onto his hip while the woman smiles. . ._

Next house.

_The girl grows up to be a fire fighter. . . or a ballerina. . . or a movie writer. . . or a nurse. . . or a veterinarian. . . or a rock star. . ._

Alice couldn't help smile at that one. Next house.

_She says what she's thinking to her mother-in-law and the older woman cries. . . she says nothing and her gay son never forgives his grandma. . ._

"Does everything have to be a dilemma?" Alice groused to Jasper.

"I'm projecting happiness the instant they open the door," he said. He adjusted the jaunty angle of the knit hat that he didn't need, but that brought out the gold in his hair and made him look somehow angelic. Alice squeezed his hand.

"There doesn't seem to be enough happiness to go around."

Next house.

_The shopping mall is filled with screams. . . no, it's a movie theater. . . no, it's a church. . . no, back to the shopping mall, bloody terror and gun shots and people running. . ._

The door gave way under Alice's charge, tumbling her into an ordinary suburban living room where the coffee table was stacked with ammo and the ordinary young man sitting on the sofa in his undershirt was turning a gun barrel to point at her.

"You can't do it!" Alice said.

His voice had a lilt to it, even under the sullenness. "Can't do what? Can't shoot an intruder in my own home?"

"Can't shoot up that mall." Swift as light, she yanked the gun from his hand and tossed it behind her. He looked at his hands as if he didn't understand where the gun had gone.

"Don't know what you're talking about."

"You're planning to shoot up a mall." The others have gathered behind her now, whispering in various stages of confusion. Alice wished Edward were here, not out doing last-minute shopping: he'd know without her having to explain. "That's a crime."

"Right now, I haven't done anything. You can't bust into my house and accuse me of things I haven't done. There's no thought police. It's a free country."

"Don't you at least have an incriminating Facebook page or something?" Alice snapped. Edward in his eat-the-evil phase would have taken care of this five minutes ago.

Esme placed a hand on her arm as she stepped forward. "We're here to invite you to Christmas dinner. You've. . . you've won a prize. Get a shirt on and come along."

The young man frowned. "This some kind of lottery?"

"That's exactly what it is," Alice said. Emmett stepped forward to heft the young man over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes: Alice could have managed the weight, but he would have been hard to carry with his legs dragging the ground from her lesser height.

_The young man checks himself into therapy. . . no, he joins a survivalist group that self-destructs in an FBI stand-off. . . no, Jasper insists on being his best friend until the non-violent mood he's given sticks permanently. . . no, one of their non-vegetarian vampire friends deserves a Christmas present. . ._


End file.
